The Republic of Wine

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For the Chinese reader, The Republic of Wine packs quite a wallop, much like the colorless liquors distilled in Mo Yan’s home province of Shandong and elsewhere in China, Maotai being the most famous. Few contemporary works have exposed and satirized the political structure of post-Mao China, or the enduring obsession of the Chinese about food, with the wit and venom of this explosive novel; none even approaches its structural inventiveness. As with many of Mo Yan’s novels, The Republic of Wine was considered extremely subversive, and could be published in China only after a Taiwanese edition appeared in 1992. Subsequently included in his multi-volume collected works under the new title Republic of Drunks (Mingding guo), it continues to thrill some and horrify others.

In the book, letter-writer Mo Yan tells Li Yidou that he has long wanted to write a novel on liquor.’ Well, here it is, under the terse but revealing title of Jiu guo, the literal meaning of which is ‘country of alcohol.’ (The generic term jiu refers to all alcoholic beverages, and must be expanded adjectivally to indicate type.) Most of what is guzzled in The Republic of Wine is actually 120-proof and stronger liquor made of sorghum or other grains.

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